Nathan J. Brelsford
Phoenix bankruptcy attorney. Practicing in Arizona since 2005.
Why I do this work
Most of what lawyers do is fight over who takes the loss. Bankruptcy is one of the few corners of the law that exists to give somebody their life back.
People come in carrying something they think is a moral failure — and it's almost never that. It's a cancer diagnosis, a divorce, a business that didn't make it, three years of trying to outrun interest that was never going to let them. What I get to tell them is that the law already anticipated this. There's a process. It's designed for exactly you.
And then the thing actually works. The calls stop. The garnishment stops. Somebody sleeps through the night for the first time in a year. I don't get many cases where the client walks out worse off than they walked in, and if you know lawyers, you know that's rare.
What the work actually is
It's not glamorous, and it's nothing like the form-filling people imagine. The whole job is judgment — exemptions, timing, what a trustee will look twice at, whether a plan survives five years. Get one of those wrong and somebody loses a house they were entitled to keep.
I came to this from numbers before I came to it from law. My first degree was in accounting, at Arizona State. Bankruptcy is a math practice wearing a legal costume — the means test, the schedules, valuing what you own, the tax consequences of a discharge. Being fluent in that arithmetic is most of what keeps a case from going sideways.
When you hire me, you get me
There are a few legal assistants here I trust completely. They handle scheduling, documents, and the parts of the process that don't turn on judgment, and they're good at it.
But your case is mine. The strategy, the decisions that matter, the meeting with the trustee — that's me, from the first conversation through your discharge. You will not be handed to someone you've never met.
Background
Education
- J.D. — University of San Diego School of Law, 2005
- B.S., Accountancy — W. P. Carey School of Business, Arizona State University, 2002
Admissions
- State Bar of Arizona
- U.S. District Court for the District of Arizona
- United States Tax Court
Practice
- Chapter 7 and Chapter 13 consumer bankruptcy in Arizona since 2006
- Thousands of individuals and families guided from filing through discharge
What happens when you call
You tell me what's going on. I'll ask questions about income, what you own, and what you owe. Then I'll tell you whether bankruptcy is actually the right tool for your situation — and if it isn't, I'll tell you that too, and what I'd do instead.
You don't need your paperwork organized. You don't need to know which chapter you'd file. And you don't need to explain how you got here — I've heard every version of it, and none of them made me think less of anybody.
Consultations are free, in person or by phone.
